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To cite this document: Samsul Islam, M. Daud Ahmed, (2012),"Business process improvement of credit card department: case study of
a multinational bank", Business Process Management Journal, Vol. 18 Iss: 2 pp. 284 - 303
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BPMJ
18,2 Business process improvement
of credit card department: case
study of a multinational bank
284
Samsul Islam
Department of Information Systems and Operations Management,
University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand, and
M. Daud Ahmed
Faculty of Business, Manukau Institute of Technology, Auckland, New Zealand
Abstract
Purpose – This paper aims to study the shortcomings of the business process of credit card
department of a multinational bank and to improve the existing business process efficiency and
effectiveness through redesigning the process that eliminates bottlenecks and improves service
quality.
Design/methodology/approach – The research investigates real-life business process using case
study methodology. It collects primary data through interviews of individuals, focus groups and
secondary data from the investigation of company documents. It then uses SWOT analysis, Fishbone
Diagram, Process Flow Diagram and a number of other tools to analyse and to redesign the existing
process.
Findings – The research identifies that the business process of the credit card department of a
multinational bank is unnecessarily lengthy and requires eight to nine days to complete from
application processing to final account creation and to issue the card. It then designs a to-be business
process for the same business function. The proposed process reduces half of the time of the existing
process.
Practical implications – The proposed business process reduces the cycle time effectively and uses
the organisational resources efficiently to achieve better customer satisfaction. It also helps in growing
card market share in this highly competitive and profitable segment of consumer products.
Originality/value – This paper illustrates a unique way of investigating an existing business
process and designing a new business process that is very efficient and effective. The design process is
quite generic which can be applied to other organisations, especially in the banking sector.
Keywords Business process improvement, Process flow, Credit cards, Business process re-engineering,
Multinational bank
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Every company has both internal and external stakeholders. Striving to deliver the best
value to the stakeholders is mandatory for survival in today’s marketplace. This is true
for every company, from local to multinational, including the market leaders. Although
all companies want to improve customer satisfaction and increase loyal customers’
Business Process Management base, they struggle to identify the way to achieve this because of inflexibility in their
Journal organisational and business processes. These companies frequently hear so much
Vol. 18 No. 2, 2012
pp. 284-303
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1463-7154
The authors would like to thank Professor Tava Olsen of the University of Auckland for
DOI 10.1108/14637151211225207 generous comments and suggestions.
about terminologies like “business process re-engineering”, “business process Business process
improvement” (BPI), “business process management”, but they find it difficult to improvement
apply any of them to redesigning and improving their existing business process to
innovative new processes that are supported by the organisational environment,
culture, and human and technological resources.
This article presents the AS-IS (current) business process and proposes a TO-BE
(new) business process of the credit card department, specifically the new account unit, 285
of a leading multinational bank, hereinafter termed “The Bank”. The Bank operates in all
continents but mainly focuses in South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, having more
than a hundred offices in these regions. One of the leaders in credit card market in
Bangladesh, and managing assets of several billion dollars, it continuously endeavours,
with various strategic marketing and service initiatives, to increase its customer base.
The credit card department highly values, and strategically positions, reduction of
customer waiting time as the most important key performance indicator of its service
initiatives and deliveries. However, improving service quality requires proper
management of business processes, from front desk to operations. The Bank
envisages high-market demands for the credit card; however, according to its sales
report, the credit card product is underperforming in market penetration in comparison
with other specialty service departments such as instalment, and small to medium
enterprises loans. The Bank mostly relies on its reputation and goodwill to attract new
credit card users and to improve its credit market share.
This study concentrates around two major objectives, the first of which is to model
and describe the AS-IS business process of the Bank’s credit card department. It then
proposes a TO-BE business process model for the credit card issuing unit targeted to
achieve significant improvement in customer service, and reduction in card processing
time as well as process-related costs. The new model aims to increase sales of the credit
card and to outperform the Bank’s other consumer products. In order to gain sustainable
competitive advantage, the model emphasises on restructuring the unit, eliminating
ineffective and inefficient steps, adapting new steps that reduce application-processing
time, and also implementing a comprehensive information system that supports and
manages end-to-end activities of the new process.
2. Process improvement
The credit card has enabled us to purchase any goods and services from anywhere in
the world. Instant buying is becoming easier and cost-effective day-by-day. In addition
to supporting purchase and sales activities, the credit card also provides instant cash
loan facilities to the account holder based on a pre-set credit limit (English et al., 2003)
that mostly supports unplanned instantaneous needs. The credit card is no longer a
luxury but a day-to-day requirement, and part and parcel of many people’s lifestyles.
Not having a credit card means riding a horse in the road instead of a car (Bilker, 1996).
Financial institutions around the world are making billions of dollars profit from the
credit card business. They are continuously evolving and introducing highly effective
customer services for credit card customers, and it is very vital that they practice the
concept of BPI to be competitive in the credit card market (Flanigan and Scott, 1995).
A business process is a series of steps of business activities, the purpose of which is
ultimate customer satisfaction by providing what customers need, when they need it and
the way they need it (Cook, 1995). Cook (1995) also defines process improvement
BPMJ as a method of improving the way by which a discrete set of business activities is
18,2 designed and managed. A number of benefits such as a feeling of contribution,
accomplishment, and of pride in work, increasing job security, creating satisfied
customers, increasing promotion and earning potential, and a sense of focus and forward
improvement, can be extracted from BPI (Flanigan and Scott, 1995). It is important to
define process boundaries so that process improvement projects can have a clear goal
286 (Sharp and McDermott, 2001) and not proceeds aimlessly, unintentionally creating other
problems instead of achieving the desired improvement. Sharp and McDermott (2001)
termed this “Framing the Process” and state a number of important attributes of process.
For example, a process has an input at the beginning and an observable result for a
stakeholder who triggered the initiating event, and may span multiple departments and
functions. A process improvement team focuses on improving one or more
characteristics of a process such as cycle time, quality and cost (Pyzdek, 2003).
Cycle time is a good measure for process improvement because it identifies
involvement of the critical resources that create bottlenecks (Tennant, 2002). A long
cycle time uses critical resources for unnecessarily lengthy periods that stifle efficient
delivery to the customer (Andersen, 1999). Performance can be improved through
reduction or elimination of wait times either before or after each step or activity (Cassidy
and Guggenberger, 2000, p. 119). They also argue to shorten the process by having a
defined start and stop, and to implement a measure that demonstrates the importance of
cycle time. Products should be delivered to the customers as quickly as possible. The
focus should be on the entire process rather than only one particular aspect of it.
Simulation is a very useful technique for identifying alternative scenarios for
improving the business process (Keller, 2004). Process simulation helps to find the
optimal solution when an AS-IS process is properly defined, documented and presented
using a flowchart diagram. A variety of software such as Sigma Flow, Microsoft Excel,
iThink, Dynamo, ARIS and Windows Workflow Foundation are available for process
simulation. A widely used software package like Microsoft Excel supports basic level
simulation. Nowadays, all the simulation software has good and easy to use Graphical
User Interfaces (Greasley, 2004). The simulation approach can be used to model the
business process, resource and cost estimation of the proposed model and to analyse
the financial constraints (Dodds, 2007). It provides numerous advantages over
prototyping such as lower cost and faster solution (West, 2004).
Prototyping is usually one of the core activities of the implementation (Harwood,
2003) that supports building of trial versions of a system as a proof of concept of the
TO-BE process scenarios. These trial versions can be used as the basis of assessing ideas
and selecting the final model (Lewis, 2004). A prototype of this finally selected process is
used to run and test the new process and to evaluate the process structure, recommended
IT solutions and organisational aspects (Knoll et al., 2001). Prototype tools allow us to
demonstrate different screen designs and understand more about the business process
and data (Coleman et al., 1996, p. 89). After successful testing and validation of the
prototype, the organisation can migrate from the existing process to the new one.
288
Figure 1.
Bangladesh consumer
market profile
Of the total population of Bangladesh, only 4 percent are “bankable”; that includes both
potential and existing customers of all the banks.
4.3 Strength, weakness, opportunities, and threat (SWOT) analysis of the Bank’s card
market
The most onerous job for the planning team is to digest information gathered to
analyse the existing situation and extract elements particularly important to the
organisation (Cowley and Domb, 1997). This can be done using SWOT analysis.
A successful organisation can reverse the threats by using its own resources (Horner
and Swarbrooke, 2005) and focusing on its strength to create opportunities.
Strengths. The Bank has a number of strengths, but the significant ones are those of
providing free air accident insurance, strong market presence and unique photo-sign
features that easily differentiate them from other service providers.
Weaknesses. Fees and charges are higher than those of competitors.
Opportunities. Competitor’s presence in the credit card market is not strong, which
gives the Bank an opportunity to grow its market share. The population of Bangladesh
is increasing at a rate of 7.3 percent per year and gradually learning to adopt consumer
finance. The bulk of the population is middle class. Different types of credit card
products have a large and easily pregnable market.
Threats. Other multinational banks are also attracted to the credit card market and
coming up with new types of credit cards. The government’s introduction of 15 percent
value-added tax on credit card service is a threat for this growing market.
Figure 2.
AS-IS (current) process
of credit cards delivery
BPMJ 5.5 Records
18,2 Applications are sent to the Credit Unit with all required documents at the time of
submission. The Credit Unit undertakes pre-screening to check whether all required
documents have been provided. If any document is missing or additional documents are
required these applications are sent back to source for fulfilment of requirement. Where
original documents cannot be provided photocopies are accepted provided they are
292 marked originals seen by DSE/PFC/CSA/Sales Manager. In the case of bank statements,
customers are required to submit the original copy. If this cannot be provided, then only
the FTE can authenticate the photocopy, by viewing the original document.
600
500 470 499 475 489 490 492
400
300
200
Figure 3. 100 91
Monthly application
processed by makers 0
MIZAN KAISER HABIB MOSTAFA BIPUL POLOK SHANTO
5.9 Key features of the existing process Business process
When discussing the improvement of a process, measuring the performance of that improvement
process is a necessary element (Andersen, 1999). The existing process features and
performances are assessed in four different ways: adaptability, effectiveness, efficiency
and timeliness (Harrington et al., 1997).
5.9.1 Process adaptability. Harrington et al. (1997) observe that process adaptability
is very difficult to measure as it assumes flexibility with changing customer 293
expectations and behaviours. The credit card department measures process adaptability
in terms of the number of special requests per month, and the percentage of special
requests granted. In one month, the new accounts unit received an average of 30 special
requests from internal employees and important customers for processing of the cards
earlier than the normal delivery time. The Unit could process fewer than 30 percent of the
special requests within the specified time. As the rest of the requests were added to the
pending jobs, job processing was continuously lengthened.
5.9.2 Process effectiveness. Effectiveness measures the degree to which a process
provides the right output at the right time and at the right place (Harrington et al.,
1997). The person or people (internal and external customers) who receive the output
should set the effectiveness standard (Harrington, 1991). Effectiveness can be
measured by: return on investment, reliability, number of new customers and morale,
etc. (Harrington et al., 1997). In the credit card processing system, each input error
(may be, in the Electronic CAPS (E-CAPS)) represents a defect. To keep track and
control it is important to find out the number of defects per million opportunities
(DPMO). In Table I, the given months represent a sigma level of 4.30 on average, which
is quite good (depends on the industry average) but falling behind Six Sigma means
there is still room for improvements; so the existing credit card delivery process is not
effective enough to process applications correctly. Here Six Sigma means 3.4 defects
(99.99 percent accuracy where cost of poor quality is , 1 percent of revenue) DPMO.
5 sigma means 233 defects (99.98 percent accuracy where cost of poor quality is
5-15 percent of revenue) DPMO. Similarly, 4 sigma means 6,210 defects (99.4 percent
accuracy where cost of poor quality is 15-25 percent of revenue) DPMO. However, the
sigma level is calculated by the formula of DPMO ¼ D/0*1,000,000 where D ¼ number
of defects; O ¼ opportunities for defects.
5.9.3 Process efficiency. Efficiency measures the degree to which a particular process
uses all of the available resources such as time, human and equipment. An efficient
process is one where resource consumption is minimised (Harrington, 1991) and in the
credit card department, it is the measurement of volume of transaction processed per
employee, time to fill out a form, cost to process a transaction, and number of documents
used per transaction. Efficiency of the existing process of the new accounts unit is
measured as the number of applications processed per month as shown in Figure 3. It is
evident from the figure that the Unit processes an average of 500 applications per month
2 60%
50%
1.5 40%
1 30%
20%
0.5
10%
Figure 4. 0 0%
R Q L N P A B C D E F G H I J
Maker errors of
No of errors 3 2 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
existing process
Cum% 38% 63% 75% 88% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100%
(NAT) of Cards Operations. Errors entered here represent one particular month, which is Business process
in turn representative of other months of the year. Meanings of the errors are in Table II. improvement
A cause and effect diagram is very useful (Longest, 2004) showing the root causes of
many errors in the current process. This diagram breaks down a problem or an effect into
its components (Cook, 2004, p. 121). The causes of the problem are categorised so that the
completed diagram looks like the skeleton of a fish. This can be used to enable team
members to categorise the sources of the problems and provide ideas about the root causes. 295
There are many reasons for the credit card maker’s errors as shown in Figure 5. The
most significant errors emanate from the existing process. Process improvement gives
better performance in terms of minimising the errors. Figure 5 also further shows that
the present process is complicated because of the physical documents moving
repeatedly through a number of staff; this requires training for staff to understand and
apply it properly. Documents may have been delivered late with errors from another
unit. In addition, the process is being implemented using the maximum load without
reducing the probability of maker’s errors. The process is less than perfect as it prohibits
proper communication among the units, and management does not monitor, control or
Key Errors
L DOB
M Passport no.
N Mother’s name
O Nationality
P Residence address
Q Office address
R Contact tel. no.
S E-mail
T Friend details
U GMI/income Table II.
V Billing address List of errors for
W Country code the Pareto chart
Figure 5.
Cause and effect diagram
of maker errors
BPMJ review it at regular intervals to look for opportunities to adopt, and to improve. The
18,2 architecture of the AS-IS process is time-consuming in producing a final output to both
internal and external customers.
APPLICATION /
CARDS ASSESSED NEW ACCOUNT CARD ACCOUNT PIN / STATEMENT / ARCHIVING & CARD
SALES APPLICATIONS CALL BACK / PROCESSED
DOCS EMBOSSING MAINTENANCE STATIONERY DOCS. HOLDER
PROCESSING BILLS
REQUEST/
BRANCHES INSTRUCTION / PIN INSTRUCTION /
SOURCE DOC CONFIRMATION REQUEST PIN RCVD / ARCHIVING CARDS CUSTOMER
RECEIVED &
RECVD. & RCVD & DATE PREPARE APPLICATIONS & SERVICE
DATE STAMP
MEMBER FILE STAMP DESPATCH LIST / / FORMS & PINS
CREDIT & CARD400/ CAPS DOWNLOAD HAND OVER TO REPORTS
COLLECTION / REMB / COURIER
PHOTO +32
/ CMBOS SCRUTINY & SCAN STATEMENT BRANCHES
/ E MAIL / BBS SEND BACK PHOTO & SCRUTINY & & ADVISORY
SIGNATURE SEND BACK RETRIEVING LETTERS
CARDS
ACCOUNTS RETURN PIN SOURCE DOCS
RCVD / ON REQUIREMENT
CARDS
FOLLOW UP SALES
PEOPLE DATA AUTHORISATION
AMEND / \& RESEND
INPUT IN CAPS & RUN REMB/
PHOTO+32 & UPDATE REPORTS
ACQUIRING IN SYSTEMS
CMBOSS STATIONERY
TEAM
REORDER /
POLICY DESTROY ACQUIRING
CROSS STOCK MAINT /
UNDELIVERED DISTRIBUTION TEAM
CHECK VERIFY /
PRINTING & PINS
GENERATE LTR RETRIEVED
LEADS EMBOSSING & APPROVE DOCS.
OF CREDIT CARD
SOFT FILES APPLI.
& MERCHANT
FORWARD TO CARDS
PLATE
CCU CREATE STATEMENT OPS
GROUP BRIDGE FILE DELIVERY /
PLASTIC / IN CAPS & FOLLOW UP
TECHNOLOGY
MERCHANT ASSESSED CARD 400 & TRACKING STATIONERY
PLATE APPLI. PREPARE CREDIT
RCVD FM DESPATCH LIST &
CCU & HAND OVER COLLECTION
HR &
TO COURIER
ADMIN LETTERS
INFRA- HAND OVER PROCESSED
STRUCTURE TO COURIER BILLS &
CCU DECISION
UPDATE RETURN CARDS POD
RCVD / FOLLOW UP ACCOUNT
VENDOR IN CAPS
& RESEND SERVICE /
Figure 6. STATIONERY /
CONSUMABLES
SOFT FILES
&
ASSET OPS /
CREDIT
OPS
SIPOC diagram of Level 1 CPV
AGENT
MIS
CONTD…
SIPOC LEVEL- 2 PROCESS NAME : ACCOUNTS Business process
Supplier Input Process Output Customer improvement
PENDING APPLI TRACING
STOCK MAINT. UPLOAD GOLD CARD / UPDATED
COURIER REPORT SEND BACK & ADMIN
& REPORTS IVR FILE IN USD CARD & DATABASE
REJECT. LTR COMPILATION SYSTEMS
GENERATE ADDRESS
CHANGE
LETTER
BILLS
UAE APPROVED REPORTS COURIER
DESTROY
CARDS OPS CASE GOES CHECKING & & CPV
UNDELIVERED
TO CPV COMPILATION
CARDS
BILL
NEW LETTER/
USD CARD/
GOLD CARD
CPV REPORT
RECVD &
FORWARD TO MIS MIS
PROCESSING
& MIS
CARDS
OPS-UAE
297
CCU
CCU DECISION
RECVD &
MODIFIED
IN CAPS
VERIFY /
NEG CHECK/
LTR GENERATE &
CREATE BRIDGE
FILE
MARK / LIFT
LIEN IN
SYSTEM
SECURITY
Figure 7.
DOCS
MAINTENANCE SIPOC diagram of Level 2
Figure 8.
TO-BE (proposed) process
of credit cards delivery
10. Recommendations
BPI is a suitable solution for improving customer satisfaction (Flanigan and Scott, 1995)
299
and to achieve customer loyalty that benefits organisations (Cook, 1995) through the
increase of profitability. BPI also reduces cycle time, cost and error rate significantly
(Harrington et al., 1997). Designing and implementing a new process requires careful
attention, analysis, investigation and consideration because of the risk factors associated
with it. Managers must assess these risk factors properly (Harrington et al., 1997) and plan
to mitigate them so that the service to the customer is not compromised during
implementation of a new process. Implementation of the redesigned new processes should
be smooth. Many of the hidden risks may occur from, and are related to, the current
practice and cultural aspects exhibited by both the internal and external stakeholders. The
new process model must assess these cultural sensitivities, plan near-future events, and
strategise the implementation and change management processes. Strategy and planning
documents need to have explicitly commitment from top executives and middle
management, and free of any resistance from the affected staff (Phillips, 1995).
Strategic planning for process improvement is difficult and can be done only
through process modelling (Lientz, 2009) but they are difficult to implement because
people normally do not accept changes, for many reasons. In order to overcome the
implementation barriers, top management needs to buy into these changes, creates a
culture of urgency around the organisation (Cendrowski, 2009), provides a clear vision
and also communicates the benefits of change (King, 1997).
BPI is an ongoing activity. Commitment from each individual of the organisation is of
paramount important to continuous improvement (Aft, 2000) but only the frontline
employees lead the way and take initiatives for bringing such changes (Salaman et al.,
2005). Before transforming any business processes these employees needs to be
appropriately trained (Nelson, 2008), which may be conducted by third parties (Mathis
and Jackson, 2010) who have access to more sophisticated training materials and carried
on or off the job. All the initiatives are to be encouraged, acknowledged and rewarded.
11. Conclusion
In the highly competitive and profitable banking industry in Bangladesh, the Bank
needs to guide new ways of improving customer satisfaction through error minimisation
and a flourishing service quality. Developed countries are already far ahead of the race of
Total Quality Management, Six Sigma, Business Process Management and Best
Practices. A multinational Bank like this one in Bangladesh must lead the way and
continuously improve the business processes through BPI and BPR techniques. The
Bank may find it difficult to implement such high tech-based business processes as the
information and communication technology infrastructure of Bangladesh does not
support high-speed data connection (although the recent set-up of fibre optic cable is its
backbone) and secured mode of data transmission. Conversely, alternative business
processes can be implemented very easily within a short period of time.
BPMJ In short, the new model enables real time data processing and monitoring faster and
18,2 easier because of its simple compositions and configurations that help as an enterprise
resources planning tool to boost productivity and fair competition among employees. It
emphasises detailed documentation of each and every existing processes including the
inter-relationships, sequences, and order of execution. These pin-pointed strategies are
also important in the macro perspective, in the prospect that the whole banking sector’s
300 development has a positive correlation with the economy of the country.
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Further reading
Pande, P.S., Neuman, R.P. and Cavanagh, R.R. (2001), The Six Sigma Way Team
Fieldbook: An Implementation Guide for Process Improvement Teams, McGraw-Hill,
New York, NY.
Schmoldt, D.L., Kangas, J., Mendoza, G.A. and Pesonen, M. (2001), The Analytic Hierarchy
Process in Natural Resource and Environmental Decision Making, Springer, London.
Srinivasan, R. (2004), Services Marketing, Prentice-Hall of India Pvt. Ltd, New Delhi.